Nick Redfern: The Pyramids and the Pentagon

Nick surprised me with a 24 hour visit to LA last Sunday. Luckily, he has just released another book entitled The Pyramids and the Pentagon, about the history of US government involvement in paranormal research, so we talked a little about that and a lot about other things. Nick found that U.S. Government indeed had a wide-ranging interest in historical anomalies such as Noah’s Ark, antigravity and the method used to build the Egyptian pyramids, among other things.

We also talked about what sort of music that aliens might like (if it isn’t Tibetan music) and Nick’s Ten Commandments Of Paranormal TV. I asked Nick about his detractors, and we ended with a couple of questions Nick had for me.

Wow the Greg-Nick mind-meld was an amazing “alli alli in come free” home base type of experience after slogging it out on ATS’s new “Greer” thread. haha. As Nick says those disclosure fanatics aren’t willing to consider that the guvmint might not give them what they want. Nope it appears Greer has moved on to being the personal pope to E.T. oops I mean E.B.E.

O.K. Nick thanks for the acoustic sound spirituality spiel — I know you mention this before but you and Greg got into it a bit more. Yes I suppose it’s “lofty” to focus on non-western music as the secret breakthrough. haha. O.K. I confess to playing serious punk hardcore noise (but mixed with classical/country/jazz/reggae). I mean Greg’s taste of music with the zombie strangeness — https://twitter.com/nickredfernufo combined with Nick’s plethora of Forteana writings — who could ask for more? Despite the fact that Tibetan music really does levitate boulders if understood properly. haha. Also creates tulpas (or fill in the blank). Yeah I do have a “Devil’s Chord” thread that ironed out some stuff along its development — all on that topic.

Nee-how — isn’t that the actual Chinese word? haha. Still Nick’s ehow on the 10 most suprising living rock stars is awesome. The orgone angle that Kenn chimed in with — not to mention New Mexico as nuclear weapons central — basically including the LSD story Nick tells about one of the contactees — maybe part of MKultra? Roswell is more like a “catch all” despite the ETH obsession.

Adam Gorightly did ask me to send him a sample of Amanita Muscaria but unfortunately it hasn’t fruited yet this year. Although I did find the “destroying angel” which has no antidote — a very beautiful all white amanita shroom that kills. Last summer I found the “death cap” — another eponymous shroom. Not quite up to Nick’s target practice.

I agree on Operation Trojan Horse and Messengers of Deception and also Mothman Prophecies — all amazing classic reads — along with Project Beta and Body Snatchers in the Desert. So that’s definitely the top five ufology books. Oh wait on the sixth would be Jon Downe’s book on Puerto Rico – when he proffers the strange military devolution angle. The marmalade thing is only known by Paddington Bear, Jon’s secret avatar.

The Greer thread on ATS isn’t too bad, actually. It benefited from an actual survivor of a CSETI Ambassador to the Universe training course breaking Greer’s non-disclosure protocol and posting a photo from the event. The fact that the extraterrestrial transdimensional orbs looked exactly like the lighted hotels on the very same beach is irrelevant! Greer is the EBE pope, for sure!! Well, not in a papal connotation but more in a PayPal sense.

The Nick meme made me smile. As someone who has freelanced as a writer and a photographer I have a lot of respect for anyone who can make their living this way.

Also thanks for giving me some additions to my reading list. Rebirth of Pan looks particularly good. I am still working through Crowley’s Confessions, and he will keep me busy for a bit longer.

Interesting point at the start on how the original contactees may have had some genuine experiences and then mixed it in with a big old bowl of stuff they just made up. This seems quite likely to me for a couple of possible reasons.

1. They enjoyed the attention they got to start with and wanted to keep it going.
2. They attracted some followers and felt under pressure to keep coming up with new stuff.
3. They personally wanted more of these experiences, but they just didn’t happen.

I will finish with one of my favourite Crowley quotes, which seems quite relevant to the show.

“I slept with faith and found a corpse in my arms on awakening; I drank and danced all night with doubt and found her a virgin in the morning.”

That Crowley quote (which I was originally made aware by Robert Anton Wilson) has been a staple of my philosophy for many years now.

Nick and I agree on the contactees completely. He quoted me extensively in his Contactees book, and I recognized many things we had talked about over the years were contained in it, along with the usual extensive and groundbreaking new research.

What a fine listen the show was! Good to hear a Brit accent, too! Especially when it’s interspersed with the “click-shhhhhh” of a beer can being opened and a proper hearty belch!

I fully concur with the comments on today’s paranormal reality shows. National Geographic’s Chasing UFOs is the yet-to-be-surpassed nadir. “Let’s scour this alleged UFO crash site for artefacts and we’ll search the ground in complete darkness with cameras and lamps pointing in our faces.” Haunted Highways comes in at a very close second with its laugh-out-loud incredulous research methods. Indeed, the sound of Nick’s beer can being opened would make a fine sound bite for one of these shitty programs, “click” – “shhhhhh – what’s that?” [ad break]

With regard to the worthy books I do possess Project Beta and thoroughly enjoyed it. Have yet to read any of Nick’s but I think Body Snatchers would be my title of choice. The late Stan Gooch is one of my favoured authors of the paranormal.

I’ve just read the synopsis for Final Events and it sounds like a winner! It’ll go nicely with the recently aquired (but yet to be read) Sex and Rockets – The Occult World of Jack Parsons and Secret Agent 666.

I exchanged several letters with Stan Gooch in what ended up to be his final years — nothing too deep — but he sent me some of his excitement about the Neanderthal Human cross-breeding that was his focus. Best of all I got a nice Welsh postcard. Anyway I was encouraging him to consider the Bushmen culture which is 90% of human history — also focused on the lunar full moon trance dance paranormal healing. Gooch’s “Total Man” book and his follow-ups are classics. His emphasis on the cerebellum is also key. At least he got his books reissued and some new publications and some mixed media support like the Gooch-inspired rock band. I mean some of his stuff was wild but definitely all very fascinating.

I was shocked to learn that Stan ended his days pretty much destitute living alone in a caravan in Wales. I think he gave up on writing after the publication of Cities of Dreams which came out in 1989. The occasional letter would appear in Fortean Times but little else. (Though his The Neanderthal Legacy, which was pretty much a reissue of his previously published theories in rant form, was published in 2008.) I believe he was pissed that his theories were generally overlooked and not taken seriously but to me the guy was a genius. His ideas on evolution, folklore, left-handedness, lunar phases, duality of the mind etc are still sound. In Total Man he writes, “An elderly scholar, realizing that life has passed him by and that his single-minded devotion to study has brought him no nearer any real knowledge, attempts to conjure up a devil” which pretty much sums up Stan. Whether he summoned a devil I don’t know but he did often write of his extracurricular activity with a succubus and the appearance of a phantom Wildman conjured up during a séance!

Discussing him a put me in a mood to revisit his work but that may be delayed as Nick’s Final Events has just dropped through the letterbox!

Thanks David — yeah I think the book “Total Man” is truly amazing. I am digging into Contactees right now. I haven’t read Final Events yet but plan on it now that Greg says it’s his favorite. Wow I read the 1973 edition of “Total Man” — it really should get reissued!! I wonder if anyone will do this. Inner Traditions had reissued his work but as you say in “rant form.” Publishers are so finicky about what is just “marketable” and considering how book reading is down-played — I doubt “Total Man” would be considered “marketable.” I mean unless some dedicated small press did it. A Secret History of Consciousness
By Gary Lachman Wow — a good overview of Gooch in Gary’s googlebook review.

I doubt we’ll see a reissue of Total Man. I recall reading on one forum how someone got Gooch’s The Neanderthal Question removed from the local library on anti-Semitic grounds! Ha, obviously didn’t read the book, just the chapter titles, and didn’t realise that Gooch himself was Jewish! An overzealous PC fascist for sure!!

Since his death I’ve read that Stan claimed September 13 was a date of psychic significance for him. I’ve yet to find the verifiable source of this but what is clear is that his work was preoccupied with the moon and the importance of numbers 7 and 13. Indeed, each had their own chapter in Guardians of the Ancient Wisdom.

With that in mind maybe there is some significance in the fact that he died on Monday (moon day) September (seventh month of Roman calendar) the 13th.

On with Nick’s Final Events now and it’s proving a good read. There are Goochian motifs in there, too. Crowley’s invocation of Lam and Parson’s occult conjurations have connotations with Gooch’s materialisation of the stunted anthropoid during the séance and his night visitor the succubus. Did they both have deep access to the cerebellum? I wonder, too, if Parson’s was left-handed!

Here’s another podcast interview with Nick on his Pyramid and Pentagon book.

He tells more details about his dad’s ufo sighting while working as a radar mechanic — or at least the radar sighting and attempted chase I think of the lights. In the 1950s — outmanuvered the airforce. Well it sounds pretty mysterious — but also fairly ambiguous.

Nick makes the point — well if this stuff is real military technology the why isn’t it used like nuke weapons – to say we have them so give up or don’t attack us, etc.

But maybe it’s like Israel’s nuke weapons — everyone knows they have them but it is still denied. Right?

I forget who asked Nick the question about the disappearances in the national parks. It could be that they were referring to David Paulides’ Missing 411 stuff. He gave two really chilling interviews with George Knapp on C2C in March and, after popular demand, in June or July. I highly recommend those interviews if you can find them. Talk about weird, creepy and downright scary. He’s also given 2 interviews with Whitley Strieber on his podcast.

Paulides, formerly known best for his Bigfoot books, was also recently on Strieber’s Dreamland and Strieber, feeling that wasn’t sufficient, even got him on with Knapp on C2c again along with Strieber, about three nights ago. He’s avoiding calling his abductor Bigfoot for marketing reasons.

Noory on C2C got someone on to talk about conjuring “Philip” a few nights prior.

Sorry, I don’t remember, but if Rebirth of Pan is the book by “Jim Brandon,” his real name is William Grimstad, probably best known for his revisionist anti-Semitic book Anti-Zion, available on scribd.com … He has also appeared in Fortean Times, apparently.

I liked the bit where Nick said he likes to wear black clothes. Not clear to me whether he said it here or elsewhere, but I think The Shadow as Keel describes the entity was only seen in the writer’s flat, unoccupied, through the windows by looky-loos. Strange no one in ufology has picked up on “The Man in Black” being the presenter for the Shadow radio serial, long before 1947. Apologies if I am mixing up guests and shows.

Greg got me interested in the books he mentioned, but I haven’t been searching for any of them, now that demon0id and library.nu are gone. I did find a digitial copy of Silver Bridge by Gray Barker and am proof-reading it into various ebook formats, if anyone in future desires. Paying $100 for a book no one in the broader society really wants on ABE seems like a waste to me.

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